We arrived in SF last night. Other than major rain storms, two separate Interstate closings due to accidents, 110 degree heat from Indiana to eastern New Mexico, and a couple of rather iffy RV camp grounds that forced us to keep moving longer than we would have liked -- other than those issues it was a lovely trip!



The photo to your left is a national grassland refuge (who knew that grass was endangered?) in Texas. It surrounds a lovely lake and was a huge relief when we found it. The iffy places had ranged from scary to desolate and we got a tip at a gas station from a very nice woman with two kids (around 8 and 13) both wearing cowboy hats bigger than our SUV pulled down so the tops of their ears stuck out like Dumbo wings. The older boy was wearing spurs that Roy Rogers would have loved although I doubt the horses shared Roy's enthusiasm. Anyway, she told us about this "Refuge" and we got off on a road that could only be described as narrow, hilly (hard to believe in Texas) and windy (that is both in the twisty sense and in the 45 knot cross wind that had been blowing in our face since Oklahoma sense). The speed limit was posted at 70. Kathy suggested 35. I split the difference. When we arrived, there was an honor system with an envelope for money and a slot to put it in. We were with four other trailers, all owned by Texas Tech University. They are grad students who are studying the area for regrowth since a major fire rolled through three years ago. We found no evidence of fire. It is a bottomland lake system and it regrew incredily fast. If it hadn't been for the "Watch for Snakes!" signs posted everywhere it might have ranked as our favorite site.



By the way, in the morning Kathy spotted our first western bird -- about 250 roosting Black Vultures. Could this have been a message? On the way back to the Interstate we took this -- it cannot do justice to the sweep of the horizon. It is just so BIG!



The house looks awesome. A few issues (they used the wrong tile in each of the two guest room bathrooms) remain but generally we are very pleased. By the time we got to Santa Fe the temps had dropped to low nineties and by the time we were on our mountain they were low eighties. The high desert is amazing. By 6 PM we had turned off the AC and by 9 we were under two blankets.



I was going to have some pic's the house today but they are paving the road so we had 15 minutes to look around and then run for it. Once they began paving the road was closed until after 5 PM. I'll try get some shots for tomorrow.